Poetry Study – Shakespeare
and Hip-Hop
A PowerPoint essay and lesson from Ms. Chapman.
When I was growing up, I thought the only
people who really liked Shakespeare were a
bunch of jerks.
My soul is so dark…
Shakespeare is the
only one who
understands me… I’m
going to write two
lines of his poetry that
I found on the Internet
on my binder in
Sharpie.
Hra, ha-ha, Shakespeare,
what a wit! Although you
probably wouldn’t
appreciate him, because
you’re not as intelligent
and ancient as I am. Pass
the Grey Poupon!
I’m wearing ridiculous
pants.
Basically, I thought Shakespeare’s works were way
overrated because of the culture of adulation that
surrounded them. I felt like the hyperbole used to
describe him couldn’t be genuine.
A person who
hasn’t read
Shakespeare
can’t claim to
be educated.
Of course, I hadn’t actually read any Shakespeare at this
point in my life….
Another person whom I thought was a jerk
was my freshman biology teacher. (An
opinion I stand by, 13 years later.)
I don’t know why they call
it rap music. There’s no
music – just a bunch of
thugs shouting.*
(Not actually Mr. Shofner –
he looked worse.)
And here, Mr. Shofner would do what
I knew even then was a very stupid,
racist impression of how he thought
rappers talked and walked,
pretending that his pants were
sagging and throwing made-up gang
signs. I despised that man so much.
*If you are wondering what Mr. Shofner’s opinions on rap have to
do with biology, the answer is nothing. Other nuggets of wisdom
Mr. Shofner shared with us included: 1) the country was going to
fall apart if Al Gore was elected President, 2) those of us who
celebrated Halloween would probably wind up in Hell, 3) being
gay was unnatural and wrong. Also, he told us that evolution was
scientifically impossible.
As a kid and a teenager, I loved rap.
 I loved the rhythm and the beat, I loved how clever the lyrics were, and I loved the
emotion that was present in it. (I didn’t love some of the content in some of the songs, but
that’s a story for another day.)
 Here were some of my favorites:
Mos Def
Lauryn Hill
Brother Ali
The Roots
I went through high school and college pretty
ambivalent about Shakespeare’s works – what I
read, I enjoyed, but it never blew me away.
But then I became an English
teacher, and I needed to find a
way to help my students to be
excited about Shakespeare in a
way that I never was.
Suddenly, it dawned on me…
Shakespeare was gangsta!
The same techniques that rap
and hip-hop artists used were
strategies that Shakespeare
employed hundreds of years
ago to make his poetry and
drama popular!
First of all, Shakespeare wrote for a
popular audience.



Many of the people who attended Shakespeare’s
plays were working class poor people. Admission was
a penny (the average laborer in those times earned
five pennies per day), and those who could afford it
stood on the ground (that’s why they were called
“groundlings”) right in front of the stage. The
audience was often rowdy and impolite.
Although we read Shakespeare today, in his time his
works were meant to be performed – that is, heard
orally. “The audience was used to the spoken word,
and soon became trained in blank verse, delighting in
monologues, debates, puns, metaphors, stump
speakers, and sonorous declamation.” At this time,
only the wealthiest people had access to an
education and could read. But as an oral form of
literature, Shakespeare's plays were accessible to
people of all social classes.
Furthermore, the content of Shakespeare’s works was
highly appealing to a popular audience. Violence,
scandal, and bawdy humor drive the plots. Plus, he
had lots of dirty (some, really dirty) jokes.

Since the 1990’s, hip-hop has been one of the most
popular genres of music in the United States. Although
it was originally born out of a young, urban, AfricanAmerican culture, today its popularity is omnipresent,
extending to all parts of the world.
 If I had to lay money on it, I would say a big part of what
leads some people to criticize rap and hip-hop as “low
culture” is the fact that so many people enjoy that kind
of music. Less popular genres – classical, for example –
give the appearance of being more exclusive and
therefore more elite.

Like Shakespeare’s works, hip-hop is form of art meant
to be experienced orally. Anyone who understands
spoken language can enjoy and appreciate it – you
don’t have to have a college education.
Secondly, both Shakespeare’s works and
hip-hop are characterized by their
linguistic complexity.


Puns, metaphors, rhyme, imagery, alliteration –
Shakespeare’s language has it all! He can build a
fantastic character and tell a great story, but a lot of
what makes him a genius is how he uses words in such
beautiful, clever, original ways.
“Additionally, rap's potential for political advocacy
stems from the function of its predecessors, AfricanAmerican rhyming games, as forms of resistance to
systems of subjugation and slavery. Rhyming games
encoded race relations between African-American
slaves and their white masters in a way that allowed
them to pass the scrutiny of suspicious overseers.
Additionally, rhyming games allowed slaves to use
their creative intellect to provide inspiration and
entertainment. For example, by characterizing the
slave as a rabbit and the master as a fox, "Bre'r Rabbit
tales" disguised stories of slaves outwitting their
masters and escaping plantations behind the facade
of a comical adventure. Hip-hop journalist Davey D
connects the African oral tradition to modern rap:
‘You see, the slaves were smart and they talked in
metaphors. They would be killed if the slave masters
heard them speaking in unfamiliar tongues. So they
did what modern-day rappers do--they flexed their
lyrical skillz.’” (Blanchard)
Some examples…
"Fair is foul, and foul is fair…" (Macbeth, I, i)
“But, soft! what light
through yonder window
breaks? It is the east, and
Juliet is the sun.” (Romeo
and Juliet)
“I pack heat like I’m
the oven door…” (Jay
Z, “Heart of the City
[Ain’t No Love]”)
“I love you like a fat kid loves
cake…” (J. Cole, “Sparks Will Fly”)
I’m just a hooligan who’s
used to usin' hallucinogens
Causin' illusions again
Brain contusions again
Cutting and bruisin' the skin
Razors, scissors and pins
Jesus, when does it end?
(Eminem, “3AM”)
“Real G’s move in silence,
like lasagna…” (Lil Wayne,
“6 Foot 7 Foot”)
“If music be the food of
love, play on…” (Twelfth
Night: I, i)
Both Shakespeare’s works and rap are
noted for their rhythmic sophistication –
it’s not just about the words, but the beat.
 In Shakespeare’s works, we see a
particular kind of rhythm called “iambic
pentameter.” That means one line
composed of an alternating pattern of
stressed and unstressed syllables, for a
total of 10 beats.
 Like this: baBOOM / baBOOM / baBOOM
/ baBOOM / baBOOM
 Or like this: I AM a Pirate WITH a WOODen
LEG. (That’s not Shakespeare, but it’s fun.)
 Remember, Shakespeare wrote in this
pattern on top of composing lines that
were beautiful for their meaning.
Interlude: What’s the big deal about iambic
pentameter? (Click here.)
 Rhythm is an important component of rap
and hip-hop as well. The word “rap”
literally means “to knock or to beat” (as
in, “As someone gently rapping, rapping
at my chamber door” from Edgar Allen
Poe’s “The Raven”).
 The emphasis on beat in rap probably
comes from the use of drums in traditional
African music.
Iambic Pentameter
(Not at all the same thing.)
 So to get a little more specific, each one of those pairs
of syllables (each “ba-BOOM”) is called an “iam.” If
you put five of them (the prefix “penta”), you get a
total of 10 syllables.
 I have absolutely no idea why this is the case, but for
some reason an odd number of iams tends to make
humans feel reflective and a bit melancholy, and an
even number of iams feels lighter and sillier. Like this:
 “Now is the winter of our discontent” (five iams)
 “Come live with me and be my love” (four iams)
 Why is this? Well, I asked my guitar teacher, and his theory
was that even numbers give us a sense of completion, while
odd numbers make us feel that something is amiss.
 Okay, so what’s the big deal about iams? Is there
some reason why people like them? Well, can you
think of something that we’re all very familiar with that
beats like, “da-DUM, da-DUM, da-DUM?” …
Both Shakespeare’s works and rap/hiphop are often deeply reflective about and
critical of the world around us.
 Shakespeare shook things up. He
challenged the status quo of race
relations in Elizabethan England with
characters like Othello (a Venetian of
African descent) and Shylock (a Jewish
merchant). He often criticized women’s
oppression through his works.
 “Rap has developed as a form of
resistance to the subjugation of workingclass African-Americans in urban centers.
Though it may be seen primarily as a form
of entertainment, rap has the powerful
potential to address social, economic,
and political issues and act as a unifying
voice for its audience.” (Blanchard)
Some examples…
Hath not a Jew eyes? Hath not a Jew
hands, organs, dimensions, senses,
affections, passions? Fed with the same
food, hurt with the same weapons,
subject to the same diseases, healed by
the same means, warmed and cooled
by the same winter and summer as a
Christian is? If you prick us, do we not
bleed? If you tickle us, do we not
laugh? If you poison us, do we not die?
And if you wrong us, shall we not
revenge? (Shylock, The Merchant of
Venice)
Mr. Wendal has freedom,
a free that you and I think is dumb
Free to be without the worries of a quick to diss
society
for Mr. Wendal's a bum
His only worries are sickness
and an occasional harassment by the police
and their chase
Uncivilized we call him,
but I just saw him eat off the food we waste
Civilization, are we really civilized, yes or no ?
Who are we to judge ?
When thousands of innocent men could be
brutally enslaved
and killed over a racist grudge (“Mr. Wendel,”
by Arrested Development)
Some examples…
To be, or not to be, that is the question—
Whether 'tis Nobler in the mind to suffer
The Slings and Arrows of outrageous Fortune,
Or to take Arms against a Sea of troubles,
And by opposing end them? To die, to sleep—
No more; and by a sleep, to say we end
The Heart-ache, and the thousand Natural
shocks
That Flesh is heir to? 'Tis a consummation
Devoutly to be wished.
Come on come on
I see no changes. Wake up in the morning and I
ask myself,
"Is life worth living? Should I blast myself?"
I'm tired of bein' poor and even worse I'm black.
My stomach hurts, so I'm lookin' for a purse to
snatch.
[…]
Give the crack to the kids who the hell cares?
One less hungry mouth on the welfare.
(Hamlet, Hamlet)
(“Changes,” by Tupac)
So, your assignment:
 You will sign up to present either a sonnet from Shakespeare or a selection (100 words or more)
from a rap/hip-hop song one day over the next three weeks at the beginning of class.
 I must approve of your selection when you sign up. If you choose a rap/hip-hop song, we may
need to edit portions for strong language and content. You can find collections of both
Shakespeare’s sonnets and popular songs online, but I’m happy to help you.
 On the day that you present, you will deliver a short (~ one minute) introduction to your work.
You will write this yourself. Introduce the title and the author of your work, and any relevant
historical/biographical details. Tell us, your audience, what the major themes of the work are,
and what you liked about it. Make a point of explaining what we should pay special attention
to and listen for as you recite.
 Recite your poem. For this assignment, you may bring cue cards up to the front, but you may
not just read directly from the paper. I want to emphasize that this is a performance – we should
be dazzled by your delivery. I’ll give you a rubric like the one we used for our earlier set of
poems.
 This is worth a double daily grade.
Sources
 Mabillard, Amanda. Shakespeare's Audience: The Groundlings. Shakespeare Online. 20
Aug. 2000. (April 23, 2014) < http://www.shakespeareonline.com/essays/shakespeareaudience.html" >.
 http://www.bard.org/education/studyguides/Midsummer/audiences.html#.U1hH5vldWSp
 http://www.shakespearesglobe.com/uploads/files/2014/01/audiences.pdf